The entertainer, who would later be known as Nita Lynn, was born in
Owensboro, Kentucky as Juanita Earlynne Morris. Soon the family (her
father was in the U.S. Air Force) moved to Marked Tree, Arkansas, where
her two sisters and brother were born. "We were country kids," she
recalls. While living in Little Rock, she was on a children's radio show
at three years old, and was even elected queen of the show. Later, a
country music show at Robinson Auditorium in Little Rock, Barnyard Frolic,
featured her as a young teen talent who sang and played guitar. As an
adult, she worked with Jimmie Davis who booked gigs on Barnyard Frolic, so
Nita returned frequently. Among other stars on the show were Jim Ed Brown
and his sister, Maxine. At age 17 she began playing with Paul Howard and
The Arkansas Cotton Pickers. The family moved to the Shreveport-Bossier
City area when her father was transferred to Barksdale Air Force Base. At
age 15 she appeared on Louisiana Hayride. "My best Hayride memories are of
when I was a little fifteen-year-old girl hanging around backstage just
hoping somebody would let me sing." She finally got to sing, while the
show was on a break for the newscast. "I didn't care it wasn't on the
radio. It was on the Hayride anyhow," she recalls. By age 17 she performed
on a short-lived show on Channel 12 in Shreveport, The Country Gentlemen
and Nita, and appeared on Grand Ole Opry. She was "terribly nervous," Nita
recalls. She met Elvis Presley, but says, "I didn't like him because I
didn't like cat music and he had just murdered dear, ole Bill Monroe's
Blue Moon of Kentucky". She says she was one of several country stars who
resented Elvis turning a classic country song into a rock-n-roll piece.
Nita believes Presley "ruined" the Louisiana Hayride. "Because they would
have kids there, where they'd previously had middle-aged people and
families. So the kids came and as it was with Roy Acuff, you know, they
didn't want anybody but Elvis," she recalls. She would eventually work on
a show at WCKY in Cincinnati with Roy Acuff and Elvis Presley after
Colonel Tom Parker became Presley's manager. Meanwhile Bobby Martin and
Henry Jerome's orchestra recorded her How Long. She was also writing songs
for Tree International in the 1960s. Nita left the industry while she was
raising her sons, Robin and Keith Vosbury, and did not return to music
until 1980. She performed in Houston at a private club, Park Towers, for a
few years, working as many as six nights a week before returning to reside
in Shreveport. In 1980 a Dallas disc jockey, Jim Newton, called and asked
if she'd help him on a new television show. She taped variety shows in
Dallas for "about four to five years", working with talents such as Vern
Stovall and Boxcar Willie. "I loved to do TV. I love the camera," she
remarks. Nita recalls recording in those times as much different than
studio work today. She did plenty of session work in Nashville, when
musicians might record a song in one take, using only two to four tracks.
Her song, Kiss and Makeup with Jimmy Parrish hit Number 16 on Billboard.
She also performed on a three-week tour with Bob Wills. "Still the best
little singer in the business," Wills told her. She also worked with Chet
Atkins.